


Everybody Says That You're So Fragile

by Netgirl_y2k



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, The Knight of the Laughing Tree
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-06
Updated: 2016-10-06
Packaged: 2018-08-19 21:09:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8224868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Netgirl_y2k/pseuds/Netgirl_y2k
Summary: Lyanna Stark thwarts a kidnapping, and receives an interesting offer.





	

Lyanna's trunk thudded heavily onto the floor of her room in the Inn at the Crossroads.

"Oof," said Brandon dramatically, throwing himself full length onto the bed, muddy boots and all. "What do you have in there, rocks?"

Lyanna shoved Brandon's boots from the bed, and he sat up and ruffled her hair. "I jest; I would not deprive my sister of her wedding fripperies, however heavy they may be."

Lyanna shrugged him off; she did not want to talk of weddings. 

In truth, she wished one of her other brothers might have escorted her to Storm's End: Benjen, who had been her companion and confidante since the nursery; or sweet Ned, who would have at least been quiet and let her be. Brandon's enforced jollity was beginning to grate on her nerves. 

Brandon scrubbed at his beard and sighed heavily; it was his best impression of Lord Rickard. 

"Lyanna, it will be good for you to settle into Storm's End before your marriage. You can meet the servants and decide how you'd like your household run, and it will afford you the opportunity to get to know Robert's brothers - I imagine you'll be something of a mother to young Renly."

Brandon looked pleased with himself for coming up with that argument, and Lyanna fought the urge to roll her eyes. Why did every man in her life think motherhood was the solution to all her woes? With every letter Robert wrote it seemed like the number of sons she was to provide him with had doubled, and even the prince's proposition involved a child. 

Lyanna crossed her arms over her chest and walked to the window, her back to the room.

" _Godsdammit_ , Lyanna!" Brandon snapped. Lyanna was well acquainted with her brother's moods; after his jests and good cheer came Brandon's lord-in-waiting act, and if that didn't result in him getting his way, he'd lose his temper.

Fortunately, as quickly as Brandon flew into rages he could be just as easily distracted from them.

"Brandon?" Lyanna squinted into the dwindling evening light. "Does that carriage bear the royal sigil?"

The floorboards creaked as he crossed the room to Lyanna's side. "Ah! I heard the talk downstairs, apparently Princess Elia and her retinue have stopped here for the night on her way to Dragonstone."

"Is--" Lyanna's eyes flicked sideways towards her trunk. "Is the prince with them?"

Brandon let out a bark of laughter and knocked Lyanna's shoulder. "I will never understand what all you ladies see in that girlish, harp-playing Southron princeling."

"It's not like that," Lyanna muttered.

Brandon snorted. "I'm going down to the common room for some food, are you coming?"

Lyanna wished to endure Brandon's continued attempts to cheer her spirits about as much as she wished to chance meeting Elia Martell. "I think not. It was a long ride today, and I'd like to rest."

"Please yourself," said Brandon. "I'm told the princess has shut herself away for the evening, but mayhap that violet eyed lady-in-waiting of hers will be feeling more sociable. She seemed to like me well enough when we met at Harrenhal."

Lyanna rolled her eyes. "Brandon, you've been married less than a week."

"My sweet Cat awaits me at Riverrun," Brandon grinned wolfishly, "and what she doesn't know won't hurt her."

It was not lost on Lyanna that Brandon and Robert were not entirely unalike; it was not lost on her that the failings she found unpardonable in her betrothed were the same ones she excused in her eldest brother.

She waited until she heard Brandon's boots thump on the stairs before she crossed to her trunk. 

Lyanna's wedding gown was the first thing she saw when she opened it - white with a grey trim - she pushed it carelessly aside, along with her other dresses, smallclothes, and a pouch of pretty ribbons and pins. From beneath the clothes a painted heart tree grinned up at her from a wooden shield.

Lyanna wasn't sure why she'd kept the Knight of the Laughing Tree's shield. Benjen, mostly in jest, had suggested that she might run away and become a hedge knight. Lyanna, mostly in jest, had replied that she might sneak out of Storm's End under the cover of darkness and defend the smallfolk from bandits and robber knights. 

Under the shield, and stuffed down the side of a motley collection of Benjen's cast-off armor, was Rhaegar's letter. Lyanna drew it out to read for the hundredth time; the prince's hand was lovely and his words tempting. All Lyanna needs must do was signal, by means of a candle in her window, and she would be plucked away from her impending, inevitable marriage. 

She hadn't answered Rhaegar on the road to Riverrun; for all that Brandon had the marital loyalty of a tomcat, he'd wanted to take Catelyn Tully to wife, and Lyanna hadn't wished to ruin his wedding. But they were a week out from the Tully seat, Storm's End loomed ever closer, and Lyanna still hadn't lit the candle. 

_Tomorrow_ , she told herself, _I can always light the candle tomorrow._ She shoved Rhaegar's letter back into its hiding place.

*

It was the shouting and clash of weapons that snapped Lyanna into wakefulness.

She gathered up her nightgown and ran over to the window; she first took what she saw to be a drunken brawl, until a Targaryen guardsman impaled a roughly dressed man on his pike, and another man pitched a burning brand towards the inn.

Lyanna darted across the room and threw her door open to see Brandon run past with his sword in hand, dressed in boots and a knee-length nightshirt.

"Bandits have attacked the inn," he called to her. "Stay inside!"

Lyanna obediently closed her door, but not before she heard Brandon thumping down the stairs and bellowing in rage and joy. She crossed to her trunk and started hauling things out. She found a pair of riding breeches, and hopped on one foot and then the other to pull on her boots; she tucked handfuls of her nightgown into the waist of her breeches. 

She dug deeper into the trunk. The Knight of the Laughing Tree's shield was a jousting shield and too unwieldy to use on foot, and she couldn't put the armor on without Benjen's help - at Winterfell they'd taken turns squiring for one another. She wrenched her sword out of the trunk, and out of its scabbard. 

The sword had been a gift from Benjen, a shortsword that he could spare, though it was an awkward length, not quite a longsword, in Lyanna's hand.

She needs must have a sword of her own forged. _Yes,_ she thought bitterly, _why not ask Robert for one for my bride's gift._

Lyanna hefted the sword, wrenched the door open, and followed Brandon into the fray. Before she'd even reached the top of the stairs she encountered a man in dark roughspun attempting to force a kitchen girl into an empty bedroom; he was trying to open the door and hike the girl's skirts up at the same time. The girl was pale and weeping. 

Lyanna didn't call out, she just swung her sword and struck the would-be rapist across the shoulders with the flat of the blade.

The man released the girl and brandished a short, vicious looking dagger at Lyanna. She gathered herself, swung again, and severed his arm halfway to his elbow with a _snick_. 

The man's mouth gaped in a shocked, silent scream, and Lyanna drew back and slid the point of her sword between his ribs.

"I--" the kitchen girl's words were drowned out by the blood rushing in Lyanna's ears.

"Find somewhere to hide," Lyanna ordered, turning and taking the stairs two at a time. She could smell the smoke as soon as she arrived in the common room. She ripped strips from her nightgown and wrapped them around her nose and mouth.

"They're trying to fire the inn!" said Brandon's squire, Ethan Glover; he did a double take, "Lady Lyanna?"

Lyanna grinned behind her makeshift mask and plunged towards the inn's main door; she emerged in the coach yard to see clusters of royal men-at-arms and Brandon's companions dispatching rough looking men armed with clubs and homemade pikes. A line of men, led by Brandon himself, had formed from the well to the barn the bandits had fired, trying to prevent the flames spreading to the main building of the inn. 

She heard a female scream from across the yard. "Brandon!" Lyanna cried, not so loudly as she might have, and took off in pursuit.

She easily gained on two of the ruffians; one carried a sack over his shoulder, and the other was dragging a lady along behind him by her wrist, and even in the dark Lyanna could recognise her as Ashara Dayne, Princess Elia's companion, and the object of Brandon's occasional affections.

"Stop!" Lyanna commanded. The bandit dropped his loot, which Lyanna realised was not a sack when it let out a pained groan, and Lady Ashara cried out "Elia!" and redoubled her efforts to break free.

Lyanna planted herself with her feet apart, sword angled across her body, just like Benjen had taught her. Lyanna was a far better lance than a sword, but she had endured endless hours with the dancing master Lord Rickard had sent for in the hope of making his daughter pleasing to a Southron husband, and she had often schooled Benjen on his footwork.

Her opponent rushed her, swinging his club; Lyanna slid smoothly to the side, her sword sliced into the bandit beneath his ribs, and he fell away.

The second bandit was more cautious. He released the Lady Ashara to square up to Lyanna; that was a mistake as it afforded the Dornish lady the opportunity to retrieve a small dagger from her stocking and jam it into her abductor's back. The man let out an _oof_ of air, and Lyanna swung her sword, striking him across the temple with the flat of the blade. The ruffian crumpled, Lady Ashara ran to the princess's side, and Lyanna tugged the cloth from the lower half of her face with a triumphant grin.

Princess Elia was sitting up with Lady Ashara's aid. "Lyanna Stark?" she asked.

Brandon, arriving on the scene with Ethan Glover and Elbert Arryn, answered for her. "Lyanna! What the--?"

*

"What were you thinking, Lyanna!" Brandon raged. "What if those men had been real soldiers? What if Robert had seen you behaving like this? What if _father_ had seen you behaving like this? And who even taught you to swing a sword?"

"Benjen," Lyanna reluctantly admitted.

"Ben? He's a child."

"Benjen decided he was going to be the First Ranger of the Night's Watch when he was _nine_ ," Lyanna sniffed. "He practices day and night. I practice with him."

Brandon groaned. "I'm going to _kill_ him when I get back to Winterfell."

That was a bit rich as Brandon himself had been the one to teach Lyanna how to joust; it had amused him to see the little girl on her fat pony riding at rings.

It wasn't as though Lyanna had expected to be hailed as a hero for her actions, but-- "I saved Princess Elia, before any of you had even realised she was in danger!"

Brandon had the grace to look shamed at that. "We put one of the men who attacked us to the question, it seems that the battle and the fire were meant to distract us while the princess was snatched." He threw his hands into air. "I want to know what Rhaegar was thinking, leaving his wife so little defended!" 

Lyanna thought of the letter hidden in her trunk and her stomach swooped with guilt. 

There was a knock at the door and Ethan showed in Ashara Dayne. Lyanna couldn't help but note that the Lady Ashara had the same purple eyes as Rhaegar; though even bloodshot and with dark circles under them, Ashara's eyes looked more used to laughter than melancholy

Brandon stood and scrubbed at his beard. "Lady Ashara, this is not a good time."

"Lord Brandon," said Ashara with a hint of a smile, "you flatter yourself more than I ever could. You are not the Stark I desire this night." Lady Ashara's violet eyes flashed in Lyanna's direction; Lyanna would have enjoyed Brandon's expression more had she not been sure her own face was doing something similar. "Lady Lyanna, Princess Elia of Dorne wishes for a conversation with you."

Lyanna considered throwing herself on Brandon's mercy, but of course her brother could not know why she so dreaded an audience with Elia Martell. So all Lyanna could do was take the arm that Lady Ashara offered and allow herself to be drawn from the room.

*

Elia Martell stood before the fire, her back to Lyanna, her black hair shining in the flames. Propped up next to the fireplace was a shield displaying a grinning heart tree, and in the princess's hand was a letter that Lyanna had read so many times she was surprised that the ink hadn't faded.

Rhaegar wrote prettily, and his belief that the fate of the realm was at stake seemed to be in earnest, but seeing the letter in his wife's hand Lyanna's saw it for what it truly was - an indecent proposal that she live as mistress to a married man for however long it took to provide him with a natural child.

"How did you get that?" Lyanna asked weakly.

"I found it," Lady Ashara responded, closing the door behind them, "and the shield. Anyone who saw me going into your rooms would think me waiting for your brother."

"A useful ruse," said Princess Elia. "Tell me, Lady Lyanna, do you wish to become my husband's paramour?" Elia turned, and caught in profile against the fire the slight but distinct curve to her belly was unmistakable. 

Lyanna's breath caught in her throat. "I didn't know you were with child."

"That is not an answer," Lady Ashara said sharply from behind Lyanna. 

" _Ash,_ " the princess admonished gently. 

"Elia, please--" said Ashara, "you should sit."

The princess exhaled and sagged against the fireplace, and Lyanna saw how much strength it had taken for her to hold herself upright. She allowed Lady Ashara to assist her to a chair and take up a position at Elia's shoulder.

"This is a mistake," Ashara said.

"Lady Lyanna saved us both tonight," Elia pointed out.

"Oh, I'm going to _kill_ Arthur! I only thank the gods that Rhaenys wasn't with us."

Elia smiled wanly. "Ashara's brother was meant to be with us on this journey, but it seems my husband had other work for him. If you decide to light a candle I will not try to stop you, and surely Arthur will come and whisk you away to Rhaegar."

Pinioned between Elia's bottomless brown eyes and Ashara's haunting purple ones Lyanna said the only thing she could. "I don't want to marry Robert Baratheon."

Lady Ashara rolled her eyes, but Elia nodded with understanding. "My husband is not a bad man--" Ashara snorted at that. "He is, at least, not his father, and he truly believes he is doing what is necessary. But before you accept his offer, I would like to make a counterproposal."

Lyanna could not imagine what use she could possibly be to Elia Martell. "What are you suggesting?" 

"The Mad King has little love for me, but I am still the queen-in-waiting, if I were to offer you a position as one of my ladies neither your betrothed nor your family could gainsay me."

Lyanna frowned. "I am not sure I am suited to be a lady-in-waiting." 

"That's to the good," said Elia. "I witnessed little of tonight's events, but Ashara tells me that your bravery cannot be faulted."

"Although your technique could use some improvement,"Lady Ashara scoffed.

"And you would know, being such a famed warrior yourself," Lyanna snapped back. 

"My brother is the Sword of the Morning; the finer points of swordwork are not lost on me."

Princess Elia might not have been able to stand long unaided, but all it took was a raised finger from her to put a stop to Lyanna and Ashara's bickering.

"Dark times are coming, my lady," she addressed Lyanna. "I was already aware that I am not at forefront of my husband's thoughts, but after tonight it seems that I am not at the front of _anyone's_ mind." 

Lady Ashara looked as though she wished to argue the point, but settled for squeezing Elia's shoulder. 

"I have a young child and another on the way. My brothers are far away, my king mad, and my husband leaves much to be desired. Lady Lyanna, I find myself in need of a shield--" Elia looked meaningfully towards the fireplace, where the shield of the Knight of the Laughing Tree stood "--and you seem to have a shield in want of use."

"I-- I'll need a sword," Lyanna blurted out. 

Lady Ashara blinked, and the princess's lips quirked up in a hint of a smile. 

"My brother Brandon took my sword, and it wasn't even mine really, and I'll need one when I swear my oath to be your sworn shield." Lyanna said all this without stopping for breath.

Ashara's eyes flashed with mirth, and Elia's smile curved wider. "I'll have one forged," she promised, and Lyanna grinned wolfishly.


End file.
